| INNOVATIVE PROJECT FEATURES GREEN SPACES, HIDDEN PARKING AND ROOFTOP GARDENS: A design idea too good to hide | | Posted Thursday, February 01, 2007 2:58:02 PM by Blog57 Team | | What might be The Next Big Thing in a nationwide shift back to the urban core is almost ready to lift off on South Boulevard between Dilworth and South End. Charlotte's Conformity Corp. plans to "hide" a Lowe's home improvement store from its closest residential neighbors in Dilworth by wrapping it with a housing village. Some condos in $28.6 million Southborough actually will be attached to the sides of the big box. "That was the big coup -- hiding the store with housing," said Conformity President Monte Ritchey, whose firm competed for the development site. Construction of flats and townhomes selling from the $180,000s to the $500,000s is to start by March and be finished in summer 2008. Lowe's initially proposed a one-of-a-kind urban store with townhomes and rooftop parking on two blocks between Magnolia Avenue and Iverson Way about two years ago.... | |
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| | | Down Putting up, taking | | Posted Tuesday, January 09, 2007 1:11:44 PM by Blog57 Team | | Never mind what Gretchen Wilson sang in "Redneck Woman," her breakthrough country hit from 2004: "And I keep my Christmas lights on, On my front porch all year long ..." For some people, the bug to undecorate might bite before the last yuletide song plays on the radio Christmas Day. But as Blood, Sweat & Tears sang in 1969 to start "Spinning Wheel": "What goes up must come down ..." So without snowstorms or icy weather as a deterrent, New Year's Day often sounds the horn for homeowners, municipalities and retailers to take down, sort out, organize and store outdoor Christmas light displays for next season. Consensus on what takes longer - setup or removal - was easy: the latter across the board. The Martin family, on North Cedar Drive in Surfside Beach, powers up its displays, with extensive front- and back-yard illuminations, from Thanksgiving night through New Year's Eve.... | |
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| | | Jaipur Peacock Garden for public awareness about the National bird | | Posted Saturday, December 30, 2006 2:57:56 PM by Blog57 Team | | Jaipur, Dec 28: Jaipur has come out with another first-a garden of sculpted peacocks, which has been created 'Mayur Vatika (a peacock garden) aims at generating public awareness about the need to protect and preserve the National Bird. The gradual urbanisation of Jaipur has caused a reduction in the city's peacock population. The national bird is now mostly seen in photographs only. Visitors are thronging the 'Mayur Vatika' and have welcomed the theme. "The garden is being developed. The children are enjoying it, and the theme is great. Nowadays, we get to see peacocks only in photographs. It is a national bird, and therefore, it requires conservation. It is a good theme," said Neeraj Khandelwal, a visitor. Claiming the peacock garden to be the first of its kind in the country, Jaipur Development Authority officials say their only aim is to save the peacock from the ravages of urbanisation.... | |
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| | | Winterize garden equipment | | Posted Sunday, November 19, 2006 12:57:25 PM by Blog57 Team | | Over the past few weeks, I have written several articles about preparing the garden for winter. Most of these were related to plants and soil. There are still a couple more chores to cover. Draining the sprinkling system is important. In a perfect world, pipes would all slope perfectly toward drains, plastic pipes wouldn't have sagging places where the soil pressed them down and water would just run to the drain and be gone. If you think your sprinkling system is not perfect, you might want to perform some fall maintenance. When cold arrives with a vengeance, water left standing in sprinkling pipes will likely freeze and break pipes, heads and valves. It is disconcerting to turn on the water in the spring and have an unexpected array of fountains erupt where lines broke.... | |
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| | | Theaters Near You | | Posted Tuesday, November 14, 2006 3:02:18 AM by Blog57 Team | | 1) Hardly anyone reads my column regularly.2) No one loves the Downtown scene more than I do. (Well, except for Huell Howser.)Still, despite my affinity for all things "inner city," I've yet to secure a home in "loftabulous" Downtown Los Angeles. Instead, I live in a neighborhood sorely lacking Downtown's history, charm and energy. It's a little condo community next to Highland Park where the color scheme is a whiter shade of pale.Oh how I yearn for some of that groovy Eastern Columbia turquoise.And now I find out: My building has a termite problem so bad they have to drop one of those orange and purple tents on it. (At last, some color!) So, like a refugee on the run from what President Bush might call the "axis of evil wood-destroyers," I'm forced to find a hotel room for two nights. On the plus side, I have the perfect excuse to move Downtown - even if it's on a temporary basis.... | |
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| | | Ulster to fall silent for Armistice Day | | Posted Sunday, November 12, 2006 3:11:17 AM by Blog57 Team | | Thousands of people across Northern Ireland will bow their heads in silence this weekend to remember the dead of two world wars, alongside all those who have died serving their country. At 11am today, people across Ulster will observe a poignant two-minute silence as a mark of respect for Armistice Day - 88 years since the First World War ended on the 11th day of the 11th month. Tomorrow, there will be Remembrance Sunday services in churches and the laying of wreaths at war memorials throughout the province. The largest event is expected to be in Belfast, where SDLP Lord Mayor Pat McCarthy will lead the annual commemorations at the City Hall's Garden of Remembrance from 11am to honour the millions who have died at war. During the ceremony, expected to be attended by hundreds, wreaths will be laid on behalf of the people of Belfast, the governments of the UK, US, Canada, France and India, branches of the armed forces, individual regiments, the PSNI, the Royal British Legion and other veterans' organisations.... | |
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| | | Experience the Provence of Russell Crowe's New Film 'A Good Year' with HomesAway Luxury Villa Vacations | | Posted Friday, November 10, 2006 7:04:31 AM by Blog57 Team | | (PRWEB) November 9, 2006 -- Imagine living the life of a Provence local, like Russell Crowe portrays in the new film "A Good Year." Speaking of his Provence experience on NBC's Today Show, Crowe said, "I could not imagine a place in Europe that is more family-friendly and beautiful than Provence. To shoot a movie there and bring my family along was superb. I encourage everyone to go there." .... | |
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| | | South Africa: The coast of many colours | | Posted Wednesday, November 08, 2006 2:59:22 AM by Blog57 Team | | It was spring in South Africa - wildflower season - and my partner and I were off to tread lightly among the daisies - something I've longed to do since I was a child, growing up in the country. Having experienced the splendours of the well-trodden Garden Route eastwards from Cape Town along the Indian Ocean, we were eager to explore the road less travelled up the Atlantic west coast and into the Northern Cape interior. There was a problem, though. As regular travellers, we were experiencing the frequent fliers' guilt. The flowers of the Cape are orange, violet, pink, and every vibrant colour in the spectrum - but were we green? We'd already burned carbon footprints into the ozone to get to South Africa, and like many stressed, time-impoverished late-30s holidaymakers, we had no intention of compromising on our creature comforts.... | |
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| | | The Garden Life: Speaking Garden Voice | | Posted Monday, November 06, 2006 3:03:25 AM by Blog57 Team | | In many ways, the garden is our voice, as well as the face we present to the world. It's what our friends, family and visitors see first when they are invited to our homes and into our lives. Visitors to my garden would be surprised to pull into the driveway and arrive at Versailles, the French royal gardens. That picture would not fit their perception of a Northwest garden, or of me. I prefer a more casual approach to gardening, with native shrubs and perennial borders surrounding wooden decks. Throughout my garden, gravel walkways and fir needle paths lead the visitor through different areas and changing moods. The rose beds benefit from a surround of structural boxwood hedging in winter. Woodland paths are loose and informal; a fitting passageway through high limbed vine maple, fountains of native sword fern and rambling clusters of Oregon grape.... | |
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| | | The line of beauty | | Posted Sunday, November 05, 2006 12:54:31 PM by Blog57 Team | | Love them or hate them, ornamental grasses are here to stay. To critics, their value is incomprehensible: to them, even the most ornamental miscanthus is the same thing as the coarse rye grass found in the farmer?s field. I disagree. What else gives you such contrast in shape and texture compared to other plants ? such as the vertical line posed by a calamagrostis and loved by designers, for instance? What else sways in the lightest of breezes like deschampsias and stipas, bringing movement and rhythm to borders? On top of these graces, grasses are easy to maintain, with few diseases. .... | |
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